Elaine Coffman - [Mackinnons 06] (22 page)

She ran to the door and jerked it open before he had time to
dismount. By the time he had both feet on the ground, she was in his arms.

“I thought you would never come,” she whispered against the
solid warmth of his chest. “I’ve never known such loneliness, such desolation.
Oh, Fletcher, I’ve missed you terribly. I never knew what loneliness was until
I lost the two most important things in my life…you and my grandfather.”

“You could never lose me, Cathleen. Don’t you know that?”

She squeezed her eyes closed and hugged him to her, her
hands going around his chest. “I was afraid you had gone back to Caithness,
that I might never see you again.”

“Cathleen,” he groaned, tilting her face up so he could look
at her. “How could you think I could leave without seeing you? Do you not
understand, I could go without air sooner than I could go without seeing you
again.”

He did not give her time to answer, but ground his mouth
down upon hers, kissing her with a possessiveness, a fierceness that should
have frightened her. But all she could think of was the agony she had endured
these past few days, the way his absence had tormented her more than the
emptiness she felt over the loss of her beloved grandfather. She knew now, with
every fiber of her being, that she loved him, and that she had known he was the
one since that day at the well.

To love and not to possess. That was the agony of it. “Come
on,” he said hoarsely. “Let’s go inside.”

His arm around her, they walked into the cottage.

She lit one of the lamps, sending a dull, mellow light to
penetrate the darkness left by the fading twilight. Then she turned to look at
him, standing a short distance from her, framed in a shaft of dim yellow light.

“You know why I came?” he asked.

“Aye, to tell me you don’t want to see me again.”

She could not stop looking at him, at the way the lamplight
turned his hair to fire and his skin to the color of antique gold, and she
wondered how she would ever stand the loss.
Dearly beloved. Heart of my
heart. How much better had I not come under your spell. To love. To want. To
need like this and be undone. How can I face each morning, knowing it is
another day that you will not come?

Afraid she would cry now, she forced herself to turn away
from him, and walked to her grandfather’s chair and sat down.

“It isn’t that I don’t want to see you,” he said. “It’s a
matter of what is best for you.”

She could not hide her hurt look. “And of course you know
what is best for me.”

“Don’t make this any harder for me than it is.”

She crossed her arms in front of her now. “And is it hard
for you to turn me away?”

“Dammit! I’m not turning away. It’s just that the timing is
all wrong. Can’t you understand that? You need time to get over David’s death,
and I have to continue my search.”

That isn’t the real reason
, she thought.
He’s
hiding something. How can I make him understand what I feel?
She smiled
wistfully and looked into his beloved face. Why do I suffer so, when I know
there can never be anything for us?

He came to where she sat, going down on one knee in front of
her, his face breathtakingly close. “Cathleen…”

She shook her head. “Don’t. Don’t say anything. Please. Just
give me a moment. I don’t seem to be very good at being strong lately.” She
felt again the urge to cry and again fought against it. She would not cry in
front of him. She would save that for when he was gone, for all the times she
would be without him. He would never know that inside she felt like an old rag
doll, limp and forgotten.

“Damn you!” he said, closing his eyes as if in pain, and she
knew he was trying to resist her. “It’s too soon, don’t you understand that?
This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not here. Not now.” His eyes seemed to burn
into her, and then he was pulling her out of the chair and into his arms. “God
help me,” he groaned, holding her tightly against him. “God help us both.”

For the longest time they sat there, upon the floor, each of
them holding the other, neither of them saying anything. She felt completely
under his power, unable to resist him, although her mind urged her to use
caution. She held her breath and closed her eyes, inhaling the scent of him,
feeling his nearness, responding with both excitement and alarm. She should not
care for him this much.

At last he broke the silence. “Cathleen, Cathleen, you make
it so difficult…”

Her fingertips stopped his mouth. “Don’t talk,” she
whispered. “We do better when we don’t say anything. Just hold me.”

He groaned and buried his face in her hair.

“I make it harder for you, don’t I?” she asked. “I’m like a
child teasing a wild dog. I don’t seem to understand that it can hurt me.”

“It isn’t your fault. I know that. We have so many things
working against us. Sometimes I feel like we were plucked out of another time
and dropped here, in the midst of turmoil, unable to find our way back. It
isn’t easy for me, but I know it’s even harder on you. At least my wanting you
is something I can deal with.”

She was silent.

“Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”

She stiffened, her body tensing as his meaning became clear.
Her heart breaking, she could only whisper weakly, “Aye.”

Drawing back slightly, he looked down into her eyes. “I’m
not so certain you do. I understand how you feel. I know it’s hard when your
mind and body don’t agree,” he said. “Your body wants me, Cathleen. It’s wanted
me for some time now.”

“Aye,” she said, “it has.” She looked deep into his eyes,
and she knew that his body wanted hers, too. She did not know much about the
things that went on between a man and a woman, but she had a feeling that he
wasn’t having an easy time controlling himself.

He desired her. She saw it in his eyes, heard it in his
voice. Scalding tears ran down her cheeks and dropped onto her hands. “I wish
there was some way,” she whispered. “I want you, Fletcher, and that will be my
undoing. I am like a child. I want to have it both ways. I want you so badly I
cannot think of anything else, but my fear of dying like my mother holds me
back. My future is dark with ‘ifs ands or buts.’” She laughed, a mocking, dry
sound. “I stumble over them, do I not? If only I could think of a way, but I
canna. I fear I could sooner turn chopped straw to gold.”

He looked at her for some time, then at last, he spoke.
“There is a way,” he said, and he took her hands, pulling them around his neck
as he drew her tighter against him. She watched his eyes darken with passion as
he lowered his head to hers, and she felt herself lean into him, meeting him on
equal terms.

Warm and soft his mouth moved over hers, his body pressing
her back until she lay on the crocheted rug, his body spreading over hers, his
weight welcome and oh, so right.

She kissed him with all the aching longing that she had kept
inside of her, showing him in a way she could not speak of, feeling her body
respond to his when he began to kiss her with a hunger that made her gasp. She
could not get close enough to him.

“How?” she whispered, pulling her mouth away just long
enough to say the words. “How can we?”

“Do you trust me, Cathleen?”

She would trust him with her life, her spirit, her soul. She
would trust him until her dying day. She would trust him in all ways. “Aye,
but…” She smiled. “There’s that word again.”

“You think too much. For once, trust someone. Trust me. I
won’t hurt you. I won’t betray you. I won’t do anything to leave you with
child, but you will have to trust me. I want to make love to you, Cathleen. Can
you trust me to do that? If I give you my word that you will not get with
child, will it be enough for you?”

She made no attempt to hide the worry in her voice or the
concerned look in her eyes. “I don’t understand.”

“You will,” he said softly. “Trust me and I will show you a
way…a way to give us what we both want.”

For the first time since they had met, the restraints seemed
to fall away and she felt as free as the wind at Martinmas. They both were
free. Free to touch, to explore, to feel. There was no thought of going to the
bedroom, of making things proper. No thought of taking their clothes off.

There were no thoughts.

Only feelings guided them now, feelings too long denied, too
long held in check.

Having him touch her like this, having him so near—it was
nothing like she had imagined it would be. It was so much better. Awe seemed to
whisper through her. Delight seemed to sing in her veins. Holding her face in
his hands, he kissed her until her breathing was rapid and deep, and then he
pulled the pins from her hair and tangled his hands in it, whispering how he
had wanted to do that since the first time he had seen her.

Her hair tumbled down, covering his hands.

“Your hair,” he whispered, crushing it, “it was always your
hair that fascinated me and drew me to you, even from the beginning. God, you
are so perfect for me.”

She was not aware that he had unbuttoned her dress until she
felt him tug at the ribbon of her chemise, and felt too the warmth of his hand
upon her breast.

He turned, putting himself beneath her. She was trembling
all over. She felt herself lean toward him, closing her eyes and feeling the
weight and texture of his mouth upon hers. She steadied herself with one hand
against his chest. Everywhere he touched her she burned.

She felt his hands trembling and knew it took some resolve
on his part to maintain his control. He pulled her face gently to his, and his
lips parted, luring her, inviting her to kiss him more deeply, and she did. A
warm and vibrant current flowed through her, softening her limbs, until she
trusted him with all her weight.

The shadows of her past and future seemed to scatter until
nothing but the dream remained. She found herself nuzzling his throat, his
temples, feeling pleasure at the sound of his indrawn breath. There was power
in being with him like this, power in his being beneath her, and she on top of
him.

“God,” he groaned, “a thousand desires and so few choices.”

“I trust you,” she whispered, covering his face with a
hundred kisses. “I trust you…I trust you…I trust you.” And she knew by his
response that it was enough, for he kissed her and kept on kissing her until
she was mindless and as wild for his kisses as he was for hers.

Whenever he drew back, her mouth sought his of its own
accord.

“You want me,” he said, and she knew it was not a question,
but she could not help answering.

“Aye,” she said. “I didn’t know how much until now.”

His hands pushed her dress from her shoulders, then down
until her arms were free and her breasts were just above him, her nipples
brushing across his face lightly until they were hard with wanting. He drew one
into his mouth, surrounding it with a warm wetness that made her moan low in
her throat. Moving to the other breast, he drew its hard point into his mouth,
his hands following the line of her legs downward and drawing her skirts upward
until they lay bunched around her waist. He brought his knee between her legs
and she gasped, feeling suddenly afraid.

“Do you want to stop?”

“No, but I’m afraid.”

“Cathleen, you know what happens between a man and a woman,
don’t you?”

“Aye, I’ve seen animals…”

He almost choked. “A common mistake. And a frightening one.
Believe me, it isn’t exactly the same. A man doesn’t nake a woman stand on her
hands and knees while he comes at her from behind.”

“I am verra happy to hear that!”

“Do you understand what happens when a man is inside a
woman? What happens that makes her have a child?”

“Aye. It’s a man’s seed.”

“It is possible for a man to make love to a woman without
leaving his seed inside her.”

“How?” she asked, feeling his smile against her cheek.

“The question every man dreams of,” he whispered. “Here…I’ll
show you.”

He brought his knee up to ride against her, and she gasped.
Then his hand replaced his knee, and she felt herself go limp with desire. A
moment later, he eased her drawers down, his hands spreading across the
flatness of her stomach, then creeping up to cover her breasts, lifting,
caressing, teasing, then kissing the firmness that responded to his touch.

“Everywhere I touch you’re so delightful. I’m like a kid
with his hand in a candy jar. I don’t know what to try next.”

“My mouth,” she whispered.

“Wanton,” he murmured. “Beguiling witch. You seduce me with
your innocence, with your child’s mouth.”

His words were as seductive as his touch.

“Kiss me,” he whispered, and her mouth was against his own.
His mouth was hot, opening under hers, yielding, then taking control, slanting
over hers with a hunger that threatened to devour them both. Her body was lost
to her now, as if it were a thing separate from her, like a boat that loses its
anchor and is swept down the rapids in a swirl of sensation. Each place he
touched, each caress across yearning flesh sent her spinning off in another
direction. She felt like a priceless jewel with many facets, each one catching
the light, dazzling and leaving her blind.

How beautiful it was to love someone. Someone she could
trust. Trust…a word she would always associate with him now. It did not matter
that she was walking down a path she had never traveled, or that he was taking
her to places unknown, for she had complete and utter faith in him. She knew
him to be a man of his word.

How beautiful that she could be with him as a woman can be
with a man, and yet not risk the gnawing horror, the wrenching reminder of
where it could lead. She never knew she could make love with a man and not
worry about having a child.

As she lost herself in the touch of his flesh against hers,
she had a fleeting thought that the only thing better would have been not to
have the fear in the first place.